


Shall We Dance?

by DoreyG



Category: Blake & Avery Series - M. J. Carter
Genre: Ballroom Dancing And Grumpily Realizing They Find It Rather Romantic, Gruff Cranky and Worldweary Character Feels Soft for the Sunshiney One, Hand holding; object of pining keeps holding hand of pining character and not mentioning it, M/M, Pre-Slash
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-01
Updated: 2021-02-01
Packaged: 2021-03-12 15:28:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,484
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29137854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/pseuds/DoreyG
Summary: “Oh!” Avery said, sounding delighted. “There’s music.”
Relationships: William Avery/Jeremiah Blake
Comments: 6
Kudos: 5
Collections: Bulletproof 20/21





	Shall We Dance?

**Author's Note:**

  * For [liodain](https://archiveofourown.org/users/liodain/gifts).



> Blake & Avery is a 3 book series set in 1830s India and 1840s London. Avery, upper middle class twit with a heart of gold, is sent to India by his father to make something of himself. When he’s asked to take a message to the mysterious Blake, a man who has turned his back on the East India Company and British society in general, this triggers a series of events that sends them haring across India in search of a possibly fictitious cult and growing an awful lot closer along the way. They eventually solve that mystery, but when they reunite again in London three years later they end up having to solve more crimes and also to rebuild their relationship and their own lives along the way.
> 
> It's a lot of fun! :D

“Oh!” Avery said, sounding delighted. “There’s music.”

They were investigating a case. An unfortunate murder of a footman that had been inadequately hushed up, and now needed an intervention to avoid causing chaos. For once his goals lined up nicely with Collinson’s, as long as you ignored the fact that Collinson wanted the case solved for social cohesion and he wanted the case solved so the poor footman got justice. In pursuit of this goal he and Avery were both semi attending a party, if by semi attending a party you meant standing off in a room to the side and waiting for the vast majority of guests to depart to avoid causing a scene.

He looked up from the skirting board he was studying, watched Avery’s face instead. It wasn’t exactly a hardship; Avery was incredibly handsome no matter what, even more so when he was lit up with a glowing enthusiasm. “Yes, yes there is.”

“A waltz, if I’m correct,” Avery said dreamily, and tilted his head a little as he counted the bars. Ever since they had reunited in London he’d looked so much older than before, but animated by the music he looked just like he had when they’d met in India so very long ago. “It’s a pity we don’t have any women, or else we could while away the time with a bit of dancing.”

Every time that he thought he knew Avery fully, every time he thought he could put the man in a neat little box and let his obsession fade, he came out with something startling like that. It would’ve been annoying, if it wasn’t a big part of the reason why he cared for him quite so desperately. “I didn’t know that you liked dancing.”

“I’m not a fanatic about it, not like some people I’ve known, but…” Avery looked at him, gave a slightly bashful smile. There was a slight flush on his cheeks, and as ever when he saw that flush he wondered if he’d look much the same if he lost his mind entirely and dragged him to the nearest bed. “It’s fun. Not quite as fun as reading, mind you, but quite a few long boring nights have been enlivened by a good spot of dancing.”

He considered this for a moment, noting how Avery still looked so very bright despite his embarrassment, and then sighed and straightened. “We don’t need women.”

Avery blinked at him, obviously taken aback. “Excuse me?”

“A waltz only needs two partners,” he pointed out, slightly incredulous at the lengths he’d go to just to keep Avery happy, and gestured between them in a way he hoped looked both logical and reasonable. “And there are two of us here right now.”

“Two men waltzing together…” Avery hesitated for a long moment, and he thought that was going to be the end of it. But then, to his shock, the man gave a tiny smile and moved on to what he obviously thought was a far more important subject. “I didn’t know that you knew how to dance. You never once mentioned it.”

He lifted one shoulder in a shrug, trying not to look too poleaxed at yet another way that Avery had surprised him. He was starting to think that he could live to a hundred, and that Avery would still find a new way to stun him every single day. “You pick up a lot of things in the company.”

“Fair point,” Avery said, obviously a little giddy at the thought of having a waltz even if it was with a man instead of a pretty maiden who would hang on his every word. “I guess I should say, I didn’t know you _liked_ to dance.”

“I don’t,” he said bluntly, and then swallowed as Avery looked at him in open confusion. “Not usually, but even I have to admit that there are some perks to it. It’ll while away the time while we’re waiting for everybody else to leave. It’s a good way to keep both of our minds active. And, outside of that, the sense of intimacy created by dancing with a single partner can be quite…”

He trailed off, only narrowly resisting the urge to bite his tongue. He had gone too far, revealed too much about the feelings he’d been unsuccessfully trying to stifle for years now. He saw Avery’s forehead wrinkle in confusion, a frown spreading across his pretty face, as they stared at each other across the room in tense silence.

“Alright.” But then Avery smiled again, and stepped forward and into his arms like it really was as simple as that.

It was a little awkward at first. He hadn’t been lying to Avery, he _did_ know how to waltz, but it had been several years and he was somewhat distracted by the feeling of Avery’s warm body in his arms. There was a brief tussle over who would lead at first, one that he eventually surrendered with a faintly resigned sigh, and then it was a difficulty to remember exactly what rhythm they were supposed to be following.

The one, two, three of the waltz came back to him fairly quickly, though; and, even if he wasn’t entirely practiced in this area, at least Avery seemed to know what he was doing. They soon stepped forward into an easy box step, and before he knew it they were gliding easily across the room. He couldn’t quite pretend that they were waltzing around a ballroom, together for anyone to see, but it was rather nice despite that.

He had never been so close to Avery before, even when they had been running for their lives together. To be perfectly honest, he hadn’t been this close to anybody since his wife had died so many years ago now. He found himself staring up at Avery’s face helplessly as they waltzed around the room, clinging to his body as he mirrored every single professional step. Avery was so handsome and warm and kind, it was a genuine struggle not to scream out his feelings on every single breath.

He was so distracted by the press of their bodies together that it took him a long moment to realize they were no longer waltzing, that they were rather just standing in place and staring at each other. His gaze dropped from Avery’s eyes to Avery’s mouth, and held there. Suddenly his mind flooded with a thousand possibilities, with the thought of just standing up on his toes and finally coaxing Avery into a kiss…

“Jeremiah,” it was only Avery’s soft voice that broke the daze, or else god knows what he would’ve done. “The music has stopped.”

“Oh, of course,” he said, suddenly more embarrassed than he’d ever been, and unwound his arm from around Avery’s waist so that he could hastily step back. “We should probably go out there now. See if we can catch the servants, and gain their impressions as to what they noticed.”

Avery didn’t seem entirely inclined to let him pull away, though. When he attempted to pull his hand from Avery’s grasp, Avery only tightened his fingers and refused to let go. “What’s the hurry?”

The fantasies of more, which had never been that far away, surged back in force. He found himself gawping slightly, under the onslaught of dreams of dragging Avery in for a kiss and pressing him back against the nearest wall and sliding to his knees to show him what he’d been missing. “Uh.”

“The music has only just finished, Jeremiah,” Avery said sensibly, and smiled down at him with a warmth that made him very glad that no human was capable of reading thoughts. “All the guests will still be there, and only barely starting to leave. We should probably stay in here at least an hour more yet.”

“Oh,” he said, and blinked foolishly for a moment before reality returned in a painful and humiliating rush. “Oh! Yes, of course. That might be a little more sensible.”

But Avery didn’t let go of his hand, even when he tugged again. Avery only kept smiling down at him, and laced their fingers even more tightly together. “Maybe you’re rubbing off on me.”

There were a thousand things he could say to that, most of them relating to how he wanted to rub off on Avery in a completely different way, but he bit his lip firmly on all of them. “Mm.”

Avery led him over to a collection of slightly moth eaten chairs, and got them both sat down with their hands still interlinked. They sat there for a long moment, a touch awkwardly, and then Avery sighed and lapsed sideways into him just the slightest bit. After a long moment, where Avery’s head was safely and warmly rested on his shoulder, he started to hum the waltz himself.


End file.
